


Day 1: Sorry can’t save me now

by Smolsized



Series: Harringrove as Billie Eilish songs. [1]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Billy Hargrove Feels, Billy Hargrove Redemption, Child Abuse (mentioned), F/M, Heavy Angst, Is this my form of closure you ask? Possibly, M/M, Neil Hargrove’s A+ parenting, Not A Happy Ending, Season 3 Spoilers, Should I stop tagging now? Yes, The mind flyer, This is more of a bittersweet love letter to my fellow Harringroves, as you can see season 3 turned me into a hardcore Billy stan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-09
Updated: 2019-07-09
Packaged: 2020-06-24 19:30:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19730317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smolsized/pseuds/Smolsized
Summary: The final battle.





	Day 1: Sorry can’t save me now

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, you guys can bet your sweet asses that immediately after the shit show that was episode 8 of Stranger Things season 3, I opened up my 100th word document and began to rewrite that shit because of course the only way I will ever even think to say goodbye to Billy Hargrove is the gay way.
> 
> And I guess you could say this is my way of coping with once again losing one of my favorite characters :) which is actually not coping at all :))
> 
> Lastly the title is from ‘Listen before I go’ by of course Billie and yes, let’s get this show on the road.

Billy can feel his hands winding around the young girl's neck, can feel as his long tenacious fingers curl tight around her throat. It’s not enough to choke her but it’s enough to keep her in place. He can even feel the contractions of her throat as she intakes air or simply just swallows her spit, right under his very fingertips. He can't stop himself, he's trapped in his own body that has become more of a prison over these past few days. He wants to stop— _god_ , he wants to stop _so_ badly but he can't. He can feel everything that his body has been forced to do but he truly has no control over it all.

Around them is chaos. The group that the girl had been with, including Steve, are throwing fireworks at the monster and it’s letting out these beastly roars.

There's a moment where Billy feels his heart pound in his chest as he watches the girl's brown eyes stare up at him in absolute terror and he knows, oh he knows he's going to kill her. He’s going to drag her right over to that monster and it’ll kill her like it has everyone else. And there's not a damn thing he can do to stop himself.

But suddenly the girl is talking, she's going on about seven feet, about a beach and seagulls, about a long dress with a blue and red flower. Billy's heart clenches in his chest as the memory flashes as if it were still fresh in his mind. She's talking about his mother, about the last happy memory he has of the woman and it hurts. It hurts so bad that he feels tears well in his eyes, threatening to spill over like an overflowing sink. "You were happy." She concludes and he can feel his hands begin to ease off her throat, but it's not really him doing it.

Relief flashes across the girl's features as Billy's hands loosen around her throat. A warm tear falls from Billy's eye and down onto the brunette's face below him before his hands are back on and tightening around her throat again, startling the girl back into fear. Her smaller hands coming up to wrap around Billy's as she tries to pry them off. "I'm sorry." Billy manages to sob out, the only thing he can do other than cry. He watches as he pushes harder against her throat when she squirms and he's afraid he just might accidentally crush her windpipes.

"Billy, this isn't you." The girl manages to choke out. He can hear Max from where she has just entered the court. She’s yelling his name, begging him to stop. He wants to stop, he does but he’s not strong enough to fight off this— parasite. He knows it picked him because he’s weak, he can hear it cackling in the dark corners of his mind because it knows he doesn’t have the will power to fight back. That he has no reason to.

“You were happy again.” The teen below him says in barley a whisper and his hands shake.

“He kissed you first.” She rushes out around a choke for air and her words give him pause. Suddenly there’s the sound of his blood rushing pounding in his ears, and his heart is racing. Everything else is drowned out besides the sound of her voice.

“He grabbed your cheek and pulled you in.” The girl herself is beginning to cry and Billy isn’t sure if it’s out of fear or because she felt what he felt in that moment. “And you were afraid, you were afraid because you knew you were in love with him.” She says and she’s right. He was afraid, so fucking afraid because the last person that he loved walked out him. He didn’t want that to happen with Steve, he didn’t want to feel his heart (or what was left of it) break all over again, so he pushed him away. But of course Steve only came back, because he always came back.

“You have a reason, he’s your reason.” She says no longer fighting in his hold or attempting to pry his hands off her neck where he pins her to the ground. Instead she brings a gentle hand to his face and cups his cheek.

Just like before another tear falls from his eye but this time around his mind doesn’t feel so clouded with the thoughts of another along with his own. He’s back in control.

Billy lets go of the girl and stands to his feet, by the time his attention is on the monster the thing has begun to make its way over to them.

Billy knows she’s important, he has seen what she can do and he understands why this thing wants to kill her. She’s a threat to it. She’s the only one who can stop it.

When it lulls it’s tongue out and lunges for her with sharp teeth and clear intent Billy is quick to take the blow, he grabs at it with his hands and begins to push at it. The texture of skin feels wet and slimy under his grasp, he feels like he’s losing his grip as he pushes so that the teeth don’t connect with his face. It feels like slow motion when he glances up at the mall’s balcony, the one he knows Steve is on, and standing there staring back at him is Steve Harrington looking conflicted as ever. ‘I’m sorry.’ Billy mouths to him and he knows it’s not enough, that it’ll never make up for all that he’s done but before he can think any further on the matter the monster is piercing his side with a sharp tentacle of sorts and then another one attacks his other side. He gives a scream of pain but doesn’t let up until a third one hits him from behind and then a fourth one follows.

He knows he’s going to die here.

And if him dying could possibly save Steve, save Max, save these kids or even just buy them more time then so be it.

He dies with reason.

He can feel blood pooling around the corners of his mouth as it tries to escape, he can taste the metallic taste of his own blood on his tongue and it’s just as bittersweet as the ending he knows he’s going to get.

 _Fitting isn’t it?_ He thinks to himself. _A bad guy ending for a bad guy._

But that isn’t true. The truth is, Billy isn’t a bad guy. And yes, he knows he has done bad things before, but that was his way of survival. Once his mom left him with his father—if he could even be called that— Billy was forced to adapt. His father was a cold and cruel man who only used Billy as a means to get back at his mother for leaving him because what better pay back is there than taking a mother’s child from them? Neil didn’t care about him and he wasn’t shy in showing it.

Living with his father’s abuse for years forced him to change, forced him to become something he wasn’t and even when he wasn’t around his father he had gotten so use to playing that role that he forgot who the real him even was.

But _this_ wasn’t the real Billy Hargrove.

The real Billy Hargrove looks the monster in it’s face and gives a bloody scream as if challenging it and just seconds after the monster pierces his chest and it feels like Billy can’t breathe.

It drops him to the ground as if he were nothing more than a broken puppet it no longer wanted to play with.

But then something happens. The monster gives a wailing cry as it begins to stumble before it collapses dead with a heavy thud that shakes the whole mall. 

Billy manages a twitch of lips as he stares up at the night sky where the glass ceiling use to be and it could almost be considered a smile. “Billy?” He hears Max call out to him before she’s kneeling beside him and he begins to choke on his own blood. “Billy. Billy. get up, please get up.” She begs beginning to lightly shake his shoulders and he can hear the waver in her voice like she’s going to cry. 

“I’m sorry.” He apologizes to her and he means for everything he’s done. He knows it won’t make up for it but he wants her to know at least that he is sorry for it. 

He doesn’t even register the second set of hands on his shoulders until Steve’s face comes into view and he sees the tears brimming his eyes. “Oh god, Billy.” He sniffles staring down at him. “You’re going to be fine, just—“Steve is cut off by his own sob as his hands begin to shake.

They both know it’s a lie.

Billy knows he’s going to die and he doesn’t care because Steve gets to live. Max gets to live and so does her kid friends. He’s okay with it. With a weak bloody hand he brings his hand up to brush against Steve’s cheek.

There’s so much he wants to say.

But his hand falls limp at his side and he gives a sharp exhale.

It dawns on him as the light slips from eyes that this isn’t a bad guy ending but a hero’s.

**Author's Note:**

> So when I first started shipping Harringrove and stanning Billy, sometime during the first 3 episodes of season 2, I was content with just sitting back and reading but after season 3’s ending something just didn’t sit right with me about just reading and thus I wrote this garbage. It literally took me six days to finish because of how hard it was for me to kill Billy off all over again. I just really feel he’s a complex character who could have been explored more and that killing him was such a waste of potential. And I felt that it was a pretty shitty redemption arc because we already saw the change in him, we saw that he was ready to die for those kids the moment he grabbed the mind flyers tongue (thing?) and for me that alone is a redemption arc. But yikes, this kinda turned into a mini rant but anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed my spin on it.


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